Experiencing a breakup can be traumatic.
Like the death of a loved one, breakups can cause overwhelming and enduring grief.
The heartbreak feels excruciating, yet we sense the world needs us to hasten the recovery process.
We may not want to fully face the pain. We wonder if we even have the necessary strength. The occasional or frequent waves of agony that interrupt our day are already unbearable.
How can we start to gather the shattered bits of ourselves?
May these 3 gentle tips to heal from a breakup give you support, courage and hope.
1) Embrace your emotions
As painful as it is, we must embrace our emotions if we want to heal from a breakup.
Many of us tend to resist challenging emotions, which creates more pain in the long run. Instead, we want to learn how to acknowledge and work with our emotions.
What’s more, chronic stress and pain ravage our mind and body and keep us in fight-flight-freeze mode. As a result, our body’s capacity to rest and repair diminishes. This also tends to create a vicious cycle of negative thinking.
Fortunately, we can use EFT Tapping to reduce the intensity of negative emotions, lower our stress levels and boost our immune system.
Try this round of EFT Tapping:
Use 4 fingers of one hand to tap on the side of the other hand and say, Even though my heart is broken because this relationship is over, I deeply and completely accept myself. Say that 2 more times while tapping.
Then, tap 5 to 7 times on the top of your head and say, My heart is broken.
Tap at the beginning of your eyebrow and say, I feel so sad.
Tap on the side of your eye: This heavy feeling in my body.
Tap under your eye: The relationship is over.
Under your nose: This grief and loss.
Under your mouth: My heart is broken.
Under your collarbone: I miss being with this person.
Finally, tap about 4 inches below your armpit: It hurts so much.
Take a deep breath.
You can keep tapping with my 20-minute EFT Tapping guided session that I recorded for my clients and made available for free on Insight Timer. If you’d like, follow my profile for new recorded and live EFT sessions.
Now that you’ve reduced your emotional pain, you can now feel more grounded and find some peace of mind.
2) Respect your healing rhythm
It’s key to learn what to expect as you grieve your relationship to more easily embrace the process.
Psychologist Kristina Hallet writes that there are 7 stages of a breakup:
- Shock: the painful disconnection that evokes panic, devastation and confusion, asking yourself, “Why did this happen?”.
- Denial: hyper-focusing on signs the relationship was going to continue, thinking your partner didn’t mean it or will change their mind, rationalizing.
- Bargaining: thinking about the what-ifs, blaming yourself for the slip-ups in the relationship, attempting to fix the relationship.
- Anger: feeling angry and resentful for different reasons like a cheating partner, the sudden breakup or not enough investment in the relationship.
- Sadness and grief: accepting the reality of the breakup, dealing with the loss of shared future plans, friends and family, feeling depressed, lonely and doubtful.
- Acceptance: letting go, feeling resolved (yet sometimes revisiting one of the other stages), thinking about your own needs, feeling hopeful.
- Moving on: focusing on yourself, not constantly thinking about your ex, feeling okay with being alone, gaining wisdom from the relationship, preparing to love again.
Each person experiences these stages at a different rhythm. You may move through stages in another order and revisit certain ones.
There’s no universal standard when it comes to how long it takes to heal from a breakup, though EFT Tapping can dramatically speed up your recovery.
Different factors include:
- the length of the relationship
- how invested you were
- if you expected the breakup
- if you have depression
- the level of support you have
- your sense of self-worth
In my EFT sessions, I’ve learned that breakup grief often reveals childhood wounds of abandonment and rejection.
If we’re willing, we can gracefully receive the gift of this opportunity to learn to validate ourselves and live in the present.
3) Reclaim yourself
Despite the itch to contact your ex or peek at their social media, it’s much wiser to give yourself adequate space to heal.
Many people who experience breakups believe the relationship was their last chance at love or there will be no one like their ex again. You can use EFT Tapping here as well to clear these limiting beliefs.
You might beat yourself up about ignoring the red flags in your relationship. We feel like we should’ve known better and we can’t trust ourselves. Tap on regrets to forgive yourself and return to your inner wisdom.
Then, reflect on what you’ve learned about yourself from the relationship. Do you need to reevaluate your boundaries? What would you like in a future partner? How can you be more present for yourself?
One of my clients used to live near a beach where she and her ex shared many good and bad moments. My client asked her dearest friends to help her create new, fun memories there during a weekend getaway to imbue the space with joy.
What a delightful way to heal!
Sometimes, we believe that our partner completes us. We may feel like we can’t move on without them even if we know that it was right to end the relationship.
Yet this approach to relationships disempowers us.
One way to help establish who you are outside of the relationship is to contemplate the qualities that you appreciate about your ex. Realize that these qualities can be found within you too. Find ways to develop them.
Now’s your chance to nurture yourself, set new intentions and connect with others more deeply.
Being gentle to heal from a breakup
Love is risky.
It takes tremendous courage to love.
We’re so vulnerable when we love and yet life calls us to love anyway.
Honoring ourselves during a breakup certainly isn’t easy. The loss of a relationship invites us to be gentler with ourselves.
As we embrace our emotions, respect our healing rhythm and reclaim who we are, we learn how to connect with ourselves in the way we’ve always yearned for. This increases our capacity to love and connect with others as well.
One of life’s most painful experiences is indeed an opportunity for deep inner growth.
Want some free support?
I’m offering free EFT Tapping sessions in exchange for a short interview via Zoom.
I enjoy connecting with other women and learning about their challenges related to confidence, boundaries and relationships.
In the first 15 minutes, I’ll ask questions like “How did you discover me?” for new content ideas. In the last 15 minutes, you’ll get an EFT session to feel calm and clear. (Yes, things can shift that quickly.)
This offer isn’t a discovery call, where we discuss my paid services. It’s a fun opportunity to connect and support each other!
If you feel inspired to work with me, we can book a free call to make sure we’re a good fit.
I look forward to connecting with you!
